A Note to V. M. Molotov with a Draft Decision for the Politbureau of the C.C., R.C.P.(B.) on the Question of an Agreement with the Rutgers Group[1]

Written:October 12, 1921Published:First published in 1959 inLenin Miscellany XXXVI.

      Printed from the manuscript.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      1st English Edition,

      Progress Publishers,1965,

      Moscow,Volume 42,

      pages348b-349.Translated:Yuri SdobnikovTranscription\Markup:D. WaltersPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2003).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

12. X. 1921

ComradeMolotov,

Ienclose material on the Rutgers business.

Itis for the Council of Labour and Defenceto decide.

Isuggest that it first be decided in the C.C.—it is a political
question. And the Politbureau must have its say, as it is agoldspending.

Pleaseget the secretary to telephone all the members of the
Politbureau who will each arrange forone hourin the course of
which he will be able to familiarise himself with the material before
Friday. Each one must look through it so that it can be settled on
Friday.

Letthe secretary make up a time-table and send the material round to
each member of the Politbureau.

Adifficult question:

for:ifthe Americans keep their word, it
will be of tremendous benefit. In that case we shall not grudge600,000gold rubles.

against:will they keep their word?Heywoodis
half-anarchist.  More sentimental than business-like.Rutgersmay
succumb to Leftism.Calvertis highly garrulous. We have no
business guarantees whatever. Enthusiastic people, in an atmosphere of
unemployment, may recruit a group of “adventurous spirits” who will end
up in squabbles. We may then losepartof our 600,000 gold rubles
(they will, of course, spoil and waste some of the property) and risk
losingup to 1 million gold rublesmore, because under § 8 (the end of it) we undertake

“toreimburse the equivalent of expenditures on machines and tools
brought in by the said emigrant”.

Nosmall risk.

For: Smirnov I. N. and Maximov (of the Urals) are local people, and
they are for it.

Against: Martens should know the Americans well, and he is
against.

Pleasearrange for all the members of the S.E.C. Presidium to be on
phone call with the secretary of the C.C. on Friday from 12 to 4 p.m. in
case they are called out to the C.C.

P.S.Please also send copies of this letter to all the members of the
Politbureau.

[1]Thisdraft was written in preparation for the meeting of the
Pelitbureau on the question of an agreement with the group of American
workers and engineers headed by S. Rutgers, who had arrived in Russia (see
Note 399).

OnSeptember 23, 1921, the C.L.D. discussed the
proposal of the Rutgers group for the Nadezhdinsk Works and a number of
enterprises of the Kuznetsk coal-field to be turned over to them for
exploitation, and found it desirable to conclude an agreement, the final
terms of which were to be drafted by a commission consisting of
representatives of the S.E.C., the Commissariat for Labour and the
Commissariat for Agriculture. Lenin took part in the negotiations with the
Rutgers group and made a number of proposals in connection with the terms
of the agreement (see pp. 348-50, 652-53 of this volume, andCollected
Works, Vol.53, Fifth Russian Edition, pp. 260-61, 302-03).

Theagreement with the sponsor group (the Rutgers
group) of the American workers, which was signed on October 20, was
endorsed by the C.L.D., on October 21 and by the C.P.C. on October 25. In
November the Soviet Government signed a contract with this group, under
which the American workers were to bring with them a definite quantity of
tools, materials and foodstuffs, while the Soviet Government assigned a sum
of $300,000 for the purchase abroad of machines and equipment. Under the
terms of this contract an Autonomous Industrial Colony directly
subordinated to the C.L.D. was set up in part of the territory of the
Kuznetsk coal-field.